ABSTRACT
Friulian is spoken by over 700,000 people in Friuli, part of the administrative region ‘Friuli–Venezia Giulia’, which borders Austria in the north, Slovenia in the east, the Adriatic in the south and the Veneto in the west. Other linguistic varieties spoken in the region include Venetan, a Romance dialect, spoken in the east, in Trieste and in the extreme west, as well as in several scattered areas in the south, along the coast, and in the main towns of the region, where Friulian–Venetan diglossia is widespread. Non-Romance varieties include Slovenian dialects spoken in some eastern valleys, and German dialects spoken in a few isolated Alpine villages. Friulian is also spoken outside Friuli in a small area around Portogruaro, today in the Veneto region, but until the last century part of Friuli. Friulian-speaking communities are also present outside Italy (in Argentina, Australia, etc.; see Iliescu (1972) for a study of the Friulian spoken by emigrants in Rumania).
